“Is there a new one?”

There’s no upside in being honest with Elizabeth. So I told her that Sarah and I weren’t seeing much of each other. I steered the conversation to my heart surgery, making sure to impress her with the bloody details. Building on her revulsion (empathy?), I painted in broad strokes the portrait of a man, alone, ill, softened by his encounter with death. I wanted her to understand that I’d “changed.”

I could see she was confused.

Because she’s never, ever thought of me as vulnerable. Such a thought would bring the whole house of cards down. Bitterly and over time, Elizabeth has constructed a mental Richard voodoo doll into which she can stick pins of resentment and accusation. This voodoo doll, fully dressed in my sins, is essential to her worldview. Elizabeth needs to be certain about me. The Richard in her mind behaves in a certain way. He is an evil force. Without me to hate, Elizabeth might have to look at herself. What use am I to Elizabeth with my weak heart, my mild demeanor? I saw an opening, so softly I asked, “Are you okay?”

Perhaps she was visualizing my funeral, wondering if she would attend. I would have liked to know the answer to that question too. “Elizabeth?” She lifted her chin and I saw that her eyes were clear and hard. I’d misunderstood her silence. She wasn’t buying this new Richard.

She launched her attack. “I hate this book Richard. I like it less than anything you’ve ever written.”

How is it that some beautiful people remain beautiful for their entire lives? She was a beautiful little girl and she’ll be a beautiful old lady. It is the eternal passport that gets her through all borders. Her all-day ticket. Her license to kill. But like the proverbial fish that doesn’t know it’s wet, she takes for granted this feature of her reality. It is the common denominator in every equation she shares with every person.

Fact: It is the undying hope of every physically beautiful and highly intelligent heterosexual woman that she will someday find a man with whom she can commune as deeply in mind as in body. But the ancillary truth is, beauty, the very passport that opens all doors, contaminates any real intellectual communion. It is a distraction when it is in full flower and a headache when it begins to wilt.

I said, “You’ll have to get in line, Elizabeth. Many people hate my book.”

“Really?”

“I must be doing something right.”

She stirred her coffee and tightened her mouth, as if saddened by my failure as a writer. “Doing something right? Is that the way you look at it, Richard? You are pathological!”

“You mean, fucked up.”

“Yes. Fucked up. Disconnected. Weird. Whatever.”